Sunday, October 19

Our God is a Covenant God - Part 3

God planned to bring us into a relationship as His covenant people!

He designed two different covenants.
  1. The Old Covenant established with Israel on Mount Sinai
  2. The New Covenant established on Calvary and fulfilled on the day of Pentecost.

Each one of these covenant fulfilled a specific purpose in God's plan. So did God make a mistake in establishing the Old Covenant? NO! It was absolutely indispensable for working out His purposes.

If you read Galations 4:22-26,31, here Paul compared the Old Covenant to Ishmael, which was dependent upon the flesh and the will of man and the New Covenant he compared to Isaac, which was based upon faith and the quickening power of the Holy Spirit.

The Old Covenant God established with Israel was totally dependent upon man's obedience to the Law. He revealed the Law and His commandments through Moses, then He told Israel, 'Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and ye shall be my people: and walk ye in all the ways that I have commanded you, that it may be well unto you.' (Jeremiah 7:23)

But you know, it was impossible for man in his sinful state to keep the Law and obey all of the commandments God had given him. Even before Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the tablets, the people had created a golden calf and were worhipping it!

Israel disobeyed and the covenant with God was broken! Through their disobedience 'they limited the Holy One of Israel '(Psalms 78:41).

Why would God establish a covenant that was totally insufficient for freeing them from the bondage of sin???

God's purpose for establishing the law under the Old Covenant was to convince man of the awfulness of sin...it's misery...it's bondage into slavery! The Law was given to reveal to man his total inability to save himself and his need for a Saviour! (Galatians 3:19-20).

You see the Old Covenant was only in preparation.....a foreshadowing of the New Covenant which God would establish as an everlasting covenant, which would not be broken!!!

to be continued.....

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